Chapter 34 The Forest Went Silent
The forest swallowed me whole. Cold air burned my lungs as I ran, branches whipping past while the ground stayed familiar beneath my feet. I pushed harder, faster, like I could outrun the words still echoing in my skull.
Mate.
My chest tightened and I ran harder.
Shifters talked about mates like it was the most natural thing in the world. A destined pull. A certainty. A knowing.
My parents had been like that. Two cougars who found each other in college and never drifted. My mother used to say she felt my father before she ever saw him, that her cat recognized his before her human mind caught up.
That was how it was supposed to be. Simple. Instinctive. Undeniable.
Not whatever this was.
I dodged a fallen branch, breath coming sharper now while my cat paced restlessly beneath my skin, wanting to turn around, wanting to go back to him. Back to Jackson.
I pushed the pace until my lungs caught fire.
Now that he'd planted the idea, I couldn't stop looking back.
There had been signs. The way my entire body relaxed the second he pulled me against him.
The way sleeping beside him felt more restful than sleeping alone ever had.
The way my cat went quiet and content around him.
The way panic hit me whenever I imagined him hurt.
Oh God.
I stumbled over a root but caught myself, slowing just enough for the thoughts to crash in harder. My mother’s voice drifted up from somewhere deep and unwanted.
A wounded animal curls around its pain. Sometimes it curls so tightly it forgets how to uncurl.
I wasn’t ready to admit that might be me.
My lungs burned as I finally slowed to a stop near a creek bed deep in the forest. I bent forward, hands braced on my knees, and the cold air scraped down my throat with every rough pull.
The woods breathed around me. Leaves rustled overhead in a steady rhythm, water trickled over stone, and somewhere farther off birds called in uneven bursts.
The familiar sounds steadied me, bit by bit.
Then, gradually, they stopped.
One bird cut off mid-call. Then another. The rustling in the underbrush faded next, and silence rolled through the trees in slow, unnatural waves until nothing remained except the soft murmur of the creek and my own ragged breathing.
Every instinct sharpened as I straightened.
A twig snapped behind me.
I spun toward the sound, pulse slamming hard against my ribs as my eyes cut through the shadows. At first there was nothing but dark trunks and deeper darkness.
Then a man stepped out from behind a thick pine.
My stomach dropped.
John.
For a second my mind simply refused to take it in. He wasn’t supposed to be here. Not now. Not like this. I had no knife, no gloves, no plan of any kind. Just the sweat-soaked running clothes stuck to my skin and my bare hands.
“Well, well…” His voice was low, almost amused. “Didn’t expect to find you out here alone.”
I said nothing. My body shifted on instinct, weight balanced, rear foot back, hands loose but ready. My cat surged under my skin, furious and alert.
John took one slow step forward, head tilted. “Took me a while to place you. Different face. But those eyes…” A low chuckle. “I never forget eyes like yours.”
Revulsion crawled down my spine.
He kept coming, casual, like we were old friends catching up. “Been watching you for weeks. Pack territory. Grocery store. Cemetery. Even outside your house tonight. You really thought no one would notice?”
My jaw clenched. I was supposed to be the hunter.
“Could’ve gone straight to Thomas,” he continued, voice dropping. “But I wanted a little time with you first. Just you and me. Like old times.”
He took another step. Closer now.
“You have any idea how pissed he’s gonna be when he finds out one of the little Mitchell girls survived?”
He hadn’t told Thomas yet. Good.
John’s gaze lingered, ugly and hungry. “We had such fun last time, didn’t we?”
Every instinct screamed at me to strike. But I couldn’t. Not here. The trail was too open, too exposed. Too risky.
I needed him deeper, somewhere the trees would swallow the sound of whatever came next.
I turned and ran.
“You little bitch!” he roared behind me.
Branches whipped across my arms and face as I crashed through the undergrowth, wet earth slipping under my shoes. John charged after me, heavier and louder, smashing through the forest on pure wolf strength.
I kept going until the trail disappeared completely into the denser trees. Only then did I stop and turn sharply to face him.
John burst through a second later, breathing hard, eyes blazing.
“Gonna cut you open,” he snarled. “Then I’m gonna take my time with you. Just like before.”
Disgust rolled through me, cold and heavy.
I kept my voice flat. “You’re not going to do shit.”
He yanked the hunting knife from his belt and lunged.
I twisted sideways, the blade cutting empty air where my ribs had been a heartbeat earlier.
Without slowing, he slashed again, wider, harder, forcing me back while I tracked the set of his shoulders, the shift of his hips, the placement of every step.
He mistook retreat for fear.
"You should've stayed dead," he spat.
The next strike overextended him just enough. I slipped inside the arc, caught his wrist with both hands, and twisted hard, wrenching the arm into a brutal lock that hyperextended his elbow with a sickening jerk. The knife clattered to the ground as he screamed.
Before he could recover I drove my thumb straight into his eye.
Wet heat burst across my hand and he howled, the sound raw and furious.
I followed with an elbow to the side of his head, hard enough to stagger him, but wolf healing and pure adrenaline kept him on his feet.
He came at me almost immediately. His fist clipped my jaw and white exploded across my vision.
A kick followed right after. I ducked under it and bark exploded from the tree where his boot connected instead.
I drove my fist into his groin with everything I had.
John folded with a strangled gasp, the air punched clean out of him. My cat surged hard beneath my skin and claws ripped through my fingertips as I buried them deep in his thigh. He roared and swung a backhand that caught me full across the face.
Blood flooded my nose as we staggered apart, both of us breathing hard.
One eye was ruined and blood poured down his face and leg, yet recognition still cut across his features.
“You killed Colt and Richard.”
I spat a mouthful of blood onto the dirt. “Someone had to.”
Rage twisted his face. “You fucking bitch!”
He charged again, abandoning what little technique he still had. I sidestepped and drove my knee hard into his ribs. Something cracked under the impact, but he barely slowed. His claws raked across my side a second later, slicing straight through fabric and skin. Pain flared hot and sharp.
Then his hand locked around my throat and he slammed me into a tree hard enough that my vision blurred. Air vanished. His fingers tightened, crushing my windpipe while every instinct screamed at me to claw uselessly at his wrist.
Panic got people killed. Brian had drilled that into me until it became instinct.
So I attacked instead. My claws plunged into the side of John’s neck and ripped downward. He roared and hurled me away. I hit the ground hard, rolled twice, and came up coughing violently as air tore back into my burning lungs.
Blood streamed down his chest, soaking the front of his shirt, but not fast enough. I had missed the major arteries. Pity.
He was already coming again.
My shoulder throbbed. The gash in my side wouldn’t stop bleeding. Vision blurred around the edges.
My cat surged hard under my skin. This time I let her.
The shift tore through me without mercy. Clothes shredded. Bones cracked and realigned. I dropped to four paws and shook out my coat. My cougar screamed and launched.
She hit him square in the chest and drove him into the dirt.
Mid-fall he shifted, one moment a bleeding man, the next a massive grey-black wolf nearly twice her size.
He twisted violently beneath her and sank his teeth into her hind leg.
She yowled and raked across his muzzle, claws tearing through soft flesh.
The wolf released her with a sharp yelp and sprang back.
For one tense heartbeat they circled.
After that, the fight became pure instinct. Fur. Teeth. Blood on the ground.
The wolf was bigger, heavier, built to overpower. But cougars were built to kill.
He slammed into her side and sent her sprawling. His next lunge went straight for her throat. She twisted at the last second and his teeth sank into her shoulder instead. Pain ripped through her in a hot, blinding wave.
With a furious yowl, she drove her claws deep into his throat.
Blood poured hot and sudden, soaking her fur, her face, the leaves beneath them. Thrashing wildly, the wolf made a horrible wet choking sound, but she ripped downward with everything she had left.
He collapsed on top of her, heavy and still. She shoved free, slick with blood, and stood over him. His chest rose once. Twice. Then nothing.
She sniffed him once. Dead.
With two quick swipes of her hind paws, she scattered leaves and damp earth across the body. Then she held still, ears twitching, listening hard. Nothing followed.
As the adrenaline ebbed, pain rushed in behind it, sharp and relentless. Her hind leg throbbed where his teeth had torn in. Deep gashes burned across her side. One shoulder felt cracked.
Bad. But survivable.
Shifter healing was already working, but she needed water and to move before anyone found John.
The sound of the stream grew louder as she limped through the trees. At the bank, she waded in and lowered herself into the freezing shallows. Blood curled away from her fur in thin red ribbons as the cold current moved through it. She drank deeply.
We need to get clean, I told her. You’re doing well.
After a moment she pushed farther out until the water covered her shoulders, then submerged completely. The current washed over her muzzle, neck, and ears. When she surfaced, a rough breath tore from her lungs.
She hated every second of it, but I kept pushing her deeper into the stream.
When she finally climbed out, her legs still held. Barely.
She stayed in cougar form. The cat had more strength left than the woman right now.
By the time the back porch came into view, even the cougar was barely holding together. Paws slipped on the steps. Vision tunneled. Every breath burned.
Her legs gave out.
The shift took her before she hit the porch.
I hit the cold boards as myself again.